


Stricken

by misshoneywell



Category: Hunger Games (2012), Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins
Genre: AU, Angst, Drugs, F/M, High School, Loss of Virginity, Oral Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-02
Updated: 2013-03-02
Packaged: 2017-12-04 02:42:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,855
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/705606
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/misshoneywell/pseuds/misshoneywell
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Katniss struggles to fill a void in the wake of tragedy.</p><p> Modern day one-shot. Angst, drugs and sex warning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stricken

She could pinpoint the exact moment when she went numb, the rattling shake of her little sister's last breath marking the second when Katniss shut it all down. When life lost meaning, though grief counselors, her mother and even Prim herself had tried to prepare Katniss for the day when her favorite person in the world inevitably shuffled off the mortal coil.

She promptly stood up, released her sister's petite, still warm hand and walked calmly out of the hospital, her mother's sobs and Hazelle Hawthorne's concerned calls muted and wholly unheard as she made her exit. She walked with a single-minded purpose, her destination clear.  
  
There was a party.

There was always a party in this town. But this time, Katniss was actually going, and she had one mission that had everything to do with forgetting about the light going out in Prim’s innocent blue eyes. Eyes that had followed her around the room from the cradle to the grave, eyes that believed in fairy tales with every bat of her lashes and shone with the belief that her infallible big sister could protect her from the world and—

Stop.  
  
Katniss arrived at the party on Victor's Lane. She drank. A lot. Thresh Tanner manned the tap of the keg. He filled a cup to the brim with dark beer, surprise etched on his face as she drained it and asked for another, then another. She earned admiring looks from his football buddies when she continued to down them without compunction. She heard the shocked whispers and drank through them, too.  
  
( _Katniss Everdeen is here?)_

_(Has she ever come to one of these before?)_

_(Thought she was too good to party with the peasants.)_  
  
She danced.

She did a perfect keg stand with the help of Thom and Darius, two all-star baseball players that had never spoken to her before tonight.

She swallowed a mystery pill that David Marvel placed on her tongue.  
  
Girls thawed towards her, the ones who had shot her icy glares and giggled behind her back her whole life. They complimented her braid and touched her mother's worn shirt and called it vintage. They filled her in on the gossip she had missed for the better part of high school, pointing out the people in the room that were dating but cheating with so-in-so.

_(Finnick Odair is totally fucking Annie Cresta, it’s so obvious. How does Johanna not know?)_

Who was pregnant.

_(Clove Barker is such a slut, is it even Cato’s baby? He doesn’t look like he cares. He’s been flirting with me all night.)_

Who cheated on the SATs.

_(Bonnie is never getting into MIT now, serves the bitch right. Can’t stand her anyway. But can you believe Twill reported her?)_

Who was the hottest guy in school.

_(Duh. Everyone knows it’s Peeta Mellark. He’s never looked twice at me though, what the hell is that about. God what I wouldn’t give for that mouth on my pu—)_

_“Who gives a fuck!”_ Katniss wanted to scream, but instead said, “ _More beer, please_.”

She let Glimmer Paladino, her casual nemesis since kindergarten, pull her into a pantry and slide down next to her against the back wall. Katniss watched as she snorted cocaine from one manicured pinkie, and only hesitated for a moment before doing the same. "I always thought you were such a stuck-up bitch," Glimmer said, watching her with dilated eyes. She leaned forward and pulled Katniss' coke-dusted finger into her mouth. She slid her hand up Katniss' shirt and kissed her. Katniss let her, bored and disengaged. "But you're so hot," the blonde said breathlessly as she pulled away, her lip gloss smeared. "We can fuck if you want."  
  
Katniss stood up and walked out, leaving Glimmer in the pantry without a backwards glance.  
  
She played pool and won both times, a manic shark with fat black pupils who decimated Cato Baxter while a blurry crowd of admirers shouted encouragement from the sidelines. The night passed in a series of high fives, pounding bass and red cups.  
  
She cared about none of it; nothing except for the hollow pit in her center that was still unfulfilled and empty, unsettled with a steady want of _something_ to fill her that wasn't liquid. She found herself standing in a circle of people that she had known her entire life but had never actually had a real conversation with in seventeen years, despite knowing their parents’ names and their addresses and what they ate for lunch. She tuned out the easy, mindless chatter, her eyes traveling restlessly over their faces.  
  
She looked across the circle and made eye contact with Peeta Mellark-- perfect, golden Peeta with blond tousled waves that fell into his dreamy blue eyes, apparently number one on the dream list of preferred pussy eaters at Seneca High School. Captain of the wrestling team, president of the debate team, and the student body vice-president. The guy who slipped her his homework on two different occasions in Mr. Thread's class when she was too tired to complete her own, a result of some really bad nights with an incredibly sick Prim, taking a zero for the day even though he had the highest grade point average of anyone in the entire school. Who slid a famous Mellark cupcake across the counter at his parent’s bakery on a day when Prim actually felt well enough to eat something other than broth or jello, whispering "no charge" when Katniss went to pay him. Had even scrawled a perfectly italicized _Prim_ on it in icing, causing her little sister to smile in delight, the first real smile Katniss had seen in weeks.  
  
She wanted Peeta Mellark.  
  
He looked back at her, confused and pink cheeked and concerned. She wondered if she had white dust around her nose. She stared at him and licked her lips, new at this game of testing a man's readiness. His guileless blue eyes darted to her mouth and she suddenly just _knew_. It would be easy.  
  
He didn't protest when she stalked (stumbled, really, when looking back at this moment clearly) over to him, curling her fingers through his with a quiet claiming intent, ignoring the soft _oooo_ of the group as she pulled him blindly toward a body-packed staircase full of people who didn't even look at them sideways as they ascended the steps. She briefly wondered if this was a common sight, Peeta Mellark being dragged towards a bedroom at a party in a nameless house, and then promptly decided she didn't care.  
  
She tried two doorknobs before one yielded to her will, pulling him behind her into the darkened room.  
  
"Lock the door," she said, and in the glow that shined through the window from a street light, she saw him startle at her sudden words.  
  
"Okay," he whispered anxiously. He moved to obey, and when he turned back around she had already kicked off her shoes, stripped out of her jeans and vintage shirt to stand before him in stark vulnerability.  
  
"Katniss," he stuttered out. "This is..."  
  
"I want you," she said abruptly, reaching out her hands. "Take off your shoes. Lift your arms." He did, handsome and bewildered and submissive to her demands. She pulled his shirt over his head and remembered seeing him wear it this morning in calculus, was staring at the back of it right before her name was called over the loudspeaker to report to the principal’s office. Her mother had been waiting for her with bad news. And then they had gone to the hospital. And then...  
  
His arms dropped, his hands finding her shoulders while she deftly pulled off his belt with renewed intent, her fingers moving down to his fly before pulling his jeans past his narrow hips. She paused and looked down at his boxers, the utter silence in the room enveloping her as her fingers toyed with the band of the material. She was feeling woozy and out of control in the best kind of way when his hand slid from her shoulder to still her fingers.  
  
"I'm not very drunk," he said, his voice full of painful honesty. "Katniss, you're so far gone."  
  
"I'm here." She was raw. "But I'm not going to force you."  
  
"Force me?" His laugh was incredulous and maybe a little sad, if she wanted to analyze it hard enough. She didn't. "I've wanted you since before it was physically possible for this to happen. This is absolutely unreal for me.” He stopped and shook his head. "You don't even understand."  
  
"I don't need your pretty words," she muttered, extracting her fingers from his to yank his boxers down with finality. His erection sprang forth, proof of his need. She stared in fascination before dropping to her knees. Her palms were damp with anticipation, but she was strangely zen with what she was about to do.  
  
"What-" he started and stopped, a loud groan echoing throughout the room as she grasped the base of his cock and licked the tip hesitantly. She had only done this once with her friend Gale. It had been during Prim’s first sudden extended hospital stay after a bad reaction to her new medicine. Gale was the only person there for her as she sat and waited to hear news about Prim from her mother, alone in a dark house and scared shitless for the phone to ring. She had been so grateful for his presence that she wanted to give him _something_ , and she didn't regret it despite how awkward it had been during the act.  
  
But this— this was different. She liked Peeta's fingers tangled into her braid as she swirled her tongue around the swollen head of his cock, her hand stroking the thick length of him. She bobbed her head and took him deeper into her mouth, enjoying when Peeta pulled at her hair in response. The slight pain made the moment real to her, a pin in the arm to remind her that this wasn’t a dream, or a nightmare, and that she still existed to someone.

Her cheeks were hollow with effort, and she sped up the movement of her hand on his shaft with clumsy motions that he didn’t seem to mind at all. "Fuck, _fuck_ ," Peeta chanted, the words sounding foreign and taboo rolling off his tongue. A thrill shot down her spine and settled into a wet pool at her center.  
  
She looked up at him from beneath black tangled eyelashes, and the expression on Peeta Mellark's face as she sucked his dick was almost enough to make her forget that she wanted to die.  
  
"Wait," he panted desperately, placing a warm, shaking hand on her cheek to gently push her away. "Katniss, stop or I'm gonna...I'm gonna come."    
  
She released him with a soft pop of her mouth, a stream of precum stretching from her lips as she pulled away. He stared with wide-eyed innocence as she licked the sticky webbing away.  
  
"Who are you?" he asked in awe-tinged disbelief as she stood up and pushed him backwards onto the bed, hard and waiting as she impatiently slid her panties down and unstrapped her mostly unnecessary bra.  
  
"No one," she said, climbing over him and straddling his hips. She hesitated, suddenly very unsure of herself. He stared up at her and waited on the precipice. Her move.  
  
"I don't know what I'm doing," she said as a warning.  
  
"We can stop. We _should_ stop," he replied thickly, and she was angry at his honor, his self-control when a naked girl was hovering over his cock. "Katniss, this is crazy. I don't even have a condom—"

An expression like exquisite pain passed his face when she grasped his erection and sank down onto it without fanfare. He shouted out a curse that she muffled with the hand that wasn't balancing on his shoulder.  
  
"I'm covered," she said, more like a gasp. She was full. Totally full. It hurt like a bitch and she was stretched to the breaking point, but she felt right for the first time in weeks. She _felt._  
  
"Oh god, oh god," Peeta whimpered as she moved experimentally above him, his eyes locked desperately on hers. "Katniss." His hands blindly grasped her rocking hips as he suddenly thrust upwards, his pelvis jerking in spasms as he emptied inside of her.  
  
He stared up at her in blissful shame. She looked down at him, considering.  
  
He broke the silence first. "I'm sorry," Peeta said, covering his face with his arm. He was so embarrassed, this boy that was still sheathed inside of her, lightly pulsing and semi-hard. “That was awful for you.”  
  
"Can't we just do it again?" Katniss asked. She was confused and maybe a little disappointed, but was still grasping at the pain, on the buzz of being filled.  
  
"You- you want to do it again?" She would be amused at the genuine shock in his voice if she didn't feel so dead inside.

She nodded. "So many times," she said with flat honesty.

He made a noise of disbelief, squeezing her hips as if to confirm she was real. “I can't- I need a minute.” He sat up fully, lifting her with careful easiness to remove himself from where they were joined. Katniss was a sticky mess, blood and come leaking down her thighs. She was mostly unaffected by it, unsentimental about her virginity, but Peeta looked horrified.  
  
"This is wrong," he said shakily, looking down at the blood that was streaking him as well.  
  
He saw her expression and backtracked. "Not us. It’s just— _God_. This was so fast. I shouldn't have taken your virginity at Glimmer Paladino's rager." He sounded angry at himself.  
  
"You didn't _take_ anything." She slid off of him to sit cross legged on the bed. No point in modesty, and the comforter was already wrecked. "I chose to sleep with you. I don't care about my virginity," she assured him, patting his stomach in a cautious _there, there_ motion.  
  
"I care!" he exploded, looking pained. "Katniss, I'd never done that before either."  
  
"Oh." She felt a dull sense of surprise and something like shame and regret creeping it's way into her spine, but grief and denial pushed them away firmly. "I'm sorry."  
  
"No," he said, frustrated.  He ran his hands up his face and scrubbed at his cheeks. "I don't want you to be sorry. I just want this to mean something tomorrow."  
  
He looked at her before continuing with a swallow, his words somehow more vulnerable and naked than his bare body, " _I_ want to mean something to you tomorrow."

Katniss was quiet. He waited for whatever she would give him. She leaned forward to coax his mouth into a kiss, and Peeta’s lips parted to accept her easily. His eyes were closed, but hers were wide open as she stared at his golden eyelashes. His hand slid up the back of her head when she deepened the kiss, their tongues flicking together delicately, a much gentler form of coupling than the sex they had just engaged in. It was her apology for claiming something that held much more meaning to him than it ever had to her, a thank you for being what she selfishly needed—a  kiss full of words that didn’t come easily to her.

 Peeta groaned in soft protest when she pulled back. His eyes fluttered open and searched her face hopefully.

 "I can't promise a tomorrow."

 His face crumpled. “Katniss—“

"Come with me," she added suddenly, standing up and pulling him by the hand, feeling like a depraved Adam and Eve as she lead him towards the attached bathroom. She flipped on the light switch and stepped into the shower, looking over her shoulder at Peeta, who stood in the room with a lost look on his face.  
  
"Please," she said, and he stepped in after her.  
  
They stood under the hot water together, and the sensation of the moment was overwhelming. She didn't know if it was a combination of the booze, the drugs or Peeta Mellark's dick, but she felt as if she was floating above this day, like the nightmare below the surface was just a little further from her reach. She pushed back against Peeta's wet body in gratitude, his arms wrapping around her middle in hesitation.  
  
"My sister is dead," she said numbly, and his arms tightened stiffly.  
  
" _Oh._ Oh, Katniss," he replied into her ear, his voice thick with emotion. She couldn't believe how grief-stricken he sounded. She wondered how many people at this party knew her sister had been sick.  
  
"I can't promise a tomorrow," she repeated thickly, near tears.  
  
"Okay," he murmured softly, his soaked curls caressing her temple.  
  
"I can't promise _anything_."  
  
"I know."  
  
She turned in his arms and laid her forehead against his wet chest, the water rushing down his shoulders and sliding against her back in a hot slick waterfall. The steady drops pinged against the floor, and she lost herself in the noise, in the embrace. For the moment, it was enough.

**Author's Note:**

> One-shot that was born from an angsty moment yesterday. Anyway. I'm peetaspenis on tumblr, come hang out sometime.


End file.
